Thursday, July 1, 2010

Summer Coconut Continues

Ah - summertime! Let's keep going to the islands, mon! I've reviewed these Kisses before, but they are so good, let's look at them again:

They are coconut creme Kisses and you can see in the autopsy photo that the center is indeed creamy. But there are chunks (or shreds) of coconut in these babies. And they are damn good. They would be awesome combined with the macadamia Kisses. Yum! Aloha!

Coconut candy seems to be mainly in the following combinations:
1.) without chocolate - like those vile coconut slices we looked at (why bother?)
2.) coconut creme covered by chocolate - a coconut filling, if you will (this post)
3.) coconut (not cream) coated at least partly with chocolate (like the famous Almond Joy)
4.) coconut mixed with chocolate (not in bar form, but mixed together)
5.) coconut as an ingredient in a solid chocolate bar

You're going to see all of these variations in the next few posts. You are going to feel like you are trapped on a desert island - one that happens to have a cacao plantation and loads of coconut trees. Life could be worse.

Okay, it could be worse if you only had these:

Too much crappy Palmer chocolate, not enough coconut filling. All of Palmer's cream eggs were terrible.

You all know how I feel about Russell Stover:

This egg is more like marshmallow cream with some coconut shreds. Too sweet. The dark chocolate helps, but not enough.

I finally discovered who makes this egg! Gertrude Hawk Chocolates. I saw this exact design at their booth at Candy Expo. I bought this egg at the Mast General Store and there is no manufacturer on the label. (I really AM chocolate CSI!)

I wouldn't claim this egg either. The base is WAY too thick and the filling has some coconut shreds, but doesn't have much taste at all. No good.

See's Cocoanut eggs looks okay:

But also was overly sweet. It's the cream. Most of these coconut cream things are just too sweet.

The Godiva coconut egg:

This is much better. Good dark chocolate and a less sweet, more coconutty taste. One of the best coconut eggs.

Godiva has a coconut truffle:

And it's a little cloying. I prefer the dark chocolate with the coconut in the eggs. The truffle is a little too sweet.

Here's the problem with buying unlabeled chocolate. The first truffle I autopsied (thinking it was the coconut) was this one:

Ooops! Not coconut!

This is a roasted almond truffle and it is fabulous. Not too sweet, the almond center has a slightly salty taste. LOVE it!!

And here are the new toasted almond gems:

Wow! I loved these too - they are totally addictive!! They seemed slightly less sweet than the larger truffle. They are a sophisticates version of a peanut butter egg. Amazingly good. And the whole tube is $10 verses about $2 for one truffle.

Even more coconut to come!! I figure it's the perfect thing to cover in the summertime. And yes, it's taken me this long to get to the end of the Easter Candy! Can you believe it? So much chocolate, so little time.